Shallow Graves by Jeremiah Healy (John Francis Cuddy, Book 7)

Shamus Award Nominee for Best Hardcover Private Eye Novel of the YearA model's murder takes Cuddy into the jaws of the Boston mobShe was born Tina Danucci, but modeled as Mau Tim Dani., Her friends find the slender beauty strangled to death in her apartment, a priceless necklace of hers nowhere in sight. The police dismiss the murder as an impossible-to-solve botched robbery, so the insurance company hires John Francis Cuddy to do what the homicide detectives can't. But there's something the cops know that Cuddy doesn't: Tina's murder isn't just hard to solve, it could be deadly.Tina was the granddaughter of Tommy "the Temper" Danucci, the invisible face of the Boston mafia. She turned her back on him to become a model, but hers is the kind of family that never forgets a child. Once Danucci learns that the police have lost interest in the case, he puts the screws to Cuddy. This is one murder Cuddy has no choice but to crack.